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Keith Nuthall
THE FINAL shape of a European Union (EU) directive on design standards for recreational craft has been agreed by the EU Council of Ministers and the European Parliament. The legislation includes essential design and construction requirements for all personal watercraft, regulating noise and exhaust emissions produced by their engines.…

KEITH NUTHALL
INNOVATION from European Union-funded research has continued to offer improvements to the way that EU water utilities work. For instance, the European Commission-funded MicroChem initiative has developed miniaturised laboratory-on-a-chip systems suitable for rapid field testing of water streams. They examine water in tiny pictolitre quantities, flowing through microbore channels produced by photolithographic etching.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE FINNISH government is being threatened with legal action at the European Court of Justice for allegedly failing to protect the vulnerable Siberian flying squirrel (Pteromys volans). Finland is the only European Union home of this species, which lives in old forests.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
EUROPEAN Union (EU) ministers yesterday (Wednesday) formally agreed an amending directive that will allow member countries which do not apply International Accounting Standards (IAS) to all companies to bring in matching transparent, high quality financial reporting, so preparing the way for like-for-like financial comparisons throughout the EU.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
POLITICAL pressure has been placed on European Union ministers to press for reforms to the world coffee trading system, which has experienced a 50 per cent drop in producer prices over the past three years, slashing the income of producers.…

BY MARK ROWE
RUSSIA and vodka are inseparable bedfellows but is there room for a ménage-a-trois? Its domestic market for beer is booming, while abroad both Russian immigrant communities and western European and north American drinkers are enjoying the novelty factor of a quality brew from the traditional home of vodka.…

BY RICHARD HURST
INDIAN steel producer Tata Steel has launched an environmental impact assessment (EIA) study to determine the ecological feasibility of building a high carbon ferrochrome smelter in Richards Bay, Kwazulu-Natal. The project would attract tax relief from the South African Department of Trade and Industry’s Strategic Industrial Projects budget, with a potential subsidy being worth as much as Rand 480 million, (US$59.45 million).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A JOINT letter signed by more than 100 environmental groups – including Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, WWF and the European Environmental Bureau – has called for a “radical overhaul” of the European Union’s Euratom treaty in an ongoing review of EU institutions.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE EUROPEAN Investment Bank has drawn up plans to lend Germany’s E.ON Energie Euro 300 million to fund a 2-year investment programme aiming at promoting energy efficiency within its electricity production and distribution facilities. An EIB note said that the money would fund “state-of-the-art energy management in electricity production including renewables,” adding that the money would be focused on research and development.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE ORGANISATION for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the European Environment Agency (EEA) have developed a database containing information on environmental taxes, subsidies, tradable emission permits, and deposit refund systems in 43 countries. They want to help public authorities choose environmental policies by providing examples from around the world.…